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Stop legalization of ‘suicide and murder’: Concerned Quebecers to protest government euthanasia

QUEBEC CITY, February 20, 2013, (LifeSiteNews.com) – Their rallying cry is urgent and grave: “Euthanasia is at our doors. It's time to ring the alarm!”

The Quebec Life Coalition (CQV) is calling upon all citizens who value human life to demonstrate against the province’s upcoming legislation that would bring in euthanasia through the back door.

Pundits suspect that the Quebec government will legislate by the end of June to allow euthanasia. The law, to be based on Quebec’s Select Committee “Dying With Dignity Report” that dresses up euthanasia as “medical aid in dying,” will apply to Quebecers over the age of 18, who make the request and who have a “serious, incurable disease,” or who are in an “advanced state of weakening capacities, with no chance of improvement,” or who have “constant and unbearable physical or psychological suffering that cannot be eased under conditions he or she deems tolerable.”

A demonstration is planned for March 9 in front of the legislature in Quebec City.

“We know that we can't stop the inevitable decline of the Western culture, but those of us who are involved in this protest want to have a clear conscience. We want to be able to say that we didn't stand by idly while the State encourages suicide and legalizes murder,” wrote Daniel Arseneault, a member of CQV, in an e-mail to LifeSiteNews.com.

Arseneault said that many people in Quebec think that euthanasia, an act to deliberately cause someone’s death, is a settled matter since opponents to the proposed legislation have not been able to make their voices heard in the media.

“There is a false notion that there exists a consensus on euthanasia in Quebec, especially following the sham ‘Commission on Dying with Dignity,’ which was nothing more than a public relations endeavor to convince Quebecers that everyone is in favour of euthanasia,” he said.

Arseneault said that a “substantial minority” of Quebecers — between 21 percent and 45 percent — are in fact opposed to euthanasia but that the “political and intellectual establishment would have us think otherwise in order to stifle debate on this issue.”

Georges Buscemi, president of the Quebec Life Coalition, pointed out that legalizing murder under the name of euthanasia is a slippery slope that can only lead to abuse.

“The PQ government is trying to reassure us that the new law will have ‘safeguards’ or ‘strict guidelines’ to ensure that no abuse takes place. But who do they take us for? Don't people ever learn from history?”

Buscemi pointed out that abortion was only decriminalized in 1969 with the promise of strict safeguards and guidelines that would be put in place and enforced.

“To abort [at that time], one needed the approval of a committee of three doctors. It had to be for ‘good medical reasons’. Some, no doubt, predicted that there would be at most a few hundred yearly abortions in Quebec,” he said. “But that number grew and grew until 1988, when, with the Supreme Court Morgentaler decision, all those beautiful ‘guidelines’ and ‘safeguards’ collapsed, leaving a legal vacuum.”

“Today we're dealing with 30,000 abortions per year in Quebec [and] 100,000 in Canada,” he said. “We have abortion on demand, for any reason, [up] until the [time of] birth. That's what happened in the span of 40 years.”

“I do not see how euthanasia will be different: in a few years, what has happened with abortion will happen for euthanasia — euthanasia on demand for any or no reason — unless we do something about it now,” he said.

Karl Gunning, former head of the Dutch Doctors’ Union, stated in a 1994 speech that “Once you start looking at killing as a means to solve problems, then you’ll find more and more problems where killing can be the solution.”

Arseneault pointed out that if murder became law, the government would be sure to take advantage of the situation.

“There is also the ever-present risk of abuse on the part of the State who is in conflict of interest, since costs of caring for the mentally and physically ill are exploding,” he said.

The Quebec Life Coalition is also sounding the alarm that the government of Quebec is usurping a federal prerogative, since Canadian criminal law prohibits euthanasia.

Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition told LifeSiteNews.com in a recent interview that the Committee’s proposal for getting around current Federal law was to redefine euthanasia as a “medical treatment.” Euthanasia as a “medical treatment” would then fall under the jurisdiction of provincial health care laws.

“Because they can’t change the criminal law, they’re going to call euthanasia a ‘medical treatment’ and say it’s legal because it’s a ‘treatment.’ They’re changing the meaning of words to get a way with homicide,” he said.

The Quebec Life Coalition has slammed the approach as “undemocratic and unconstitutional.”

Top American bioethicist Wesley J. Smith has criticized Quebec’s push to legalize euthanasia, saying it will turn doctors into killers and establish broad “categories of the killable” that will apply to practically anyone seeking death for any reason.

Smith pointed out that the phrase “aid in dying” in the proposed legislation is simply a euphemism for “active killing by doctors.” He suggested that if the Committee’s recommendations are followed, then “every Quebec physician will be conscripted to participate in homicide as a condition of practicing medicine.”

The Quebec Life Coalition is asking people of faith to pray that “God will heal the spiritual blindness of too many of our fellow citizens which leads them to believe that killing is an act of compassion and suicide a worthy and beneficial gesture.”

Disney ABC embraces X-rated anti-Christian bigot Dan Savage in new prime time show

March 30, 2015 (NewsBusters.org) -- Media Research Center (MRC) and Family Research Council (FRC) are launching a joint national campaign to educate the public about a Disney ABC sitcom pilot based on the life of bigoted activist Dan Savage. MRC and FRC contacted Ben Sherwood, president of Disney/ABC Television Group, more than two weeks ago urging him to put a stop to this atrocity but received no response. [Read the full letter]

A perusal of Dan Savage’s work reveals a career built on advocating violence — even murder — and spewing hatred against people of faith. Savage has spared no one with whom he disagrees from his vitriolic hate speech. Despite his extremism, vulgarity, and unabashed encouragement of dangerous sexual practices, Disney ABC is moving forward with this show, disgustingly titled “Family of the Year.”

Media Research Center President Brent Bozell reacts:

“Disney ABC’s decision to effectively advance Dan Savage’s calls for violence against conservatives and his extremist attacks against people of faith, particularly evangelicals and Catholics, is appalling and outrageous. If hate speech were a crime, this man would be charged with a felony. Disney ABC giving Dan Savage a platform for his anti-religious bigotry is mind-boggling and their silence is deafening.

“By creating a pilot based on the life of this hatemonger and bringing him on as a producer, Disney ABC is sending a signal that they endorse Dan Savage’s wish that a man be murdered. He has stated, ‘Carl Romanelli should be dragged behind a pickup truck until there’s nothing left but the rope.’ ABC knows this. We told them explicitly.

“If the production of ‘Family of the Year’ is allowed to continue, not just Christians but all people of goodwill can only surmise that the company Walt Disney created is endorsing violence.”

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins reacts:

“Does ABC really want to produce a pilot show based on a vile bully like Dan Savage? Do Dan Savage’s over-the top-obscenity, intimidation of teenagers and even violent rhetoric reflect the values of Disney? Partnering with Dan Savage and endorsing his x-rated message will be abandoning the wholesome values that have attracted millions of families to Walt Disney.”

Dan Savage has made numerous comments about conservatives, evangelicals, and Catholics that offend basic standards of decency. They include:

Proclaiming that he sometimes thinks about “f****ing the shit out of” Senator Rick Santorum

Calling for Christians at a high school conference to “ignore the bull**** in the Bible”

Saying that “the only thing that stands between my d*** and Brad Pitt’s mouth is a piece of paper” when expressing his feelings on Pope Benedict’s opposition to gay marriage

Promoting marital infidelity

Saying “Carl Romanelli should be dragged behind a pickup truck until there’s nothing left but the rope.”

Telling Bill Maher that he wished Republicans “were all f***ing dead”

Telling Dr. Ben Carson to “suck my d***. Name the time and place and I’ll bring my d*** and a camera crew and you can s*** me off and win the argument.”

Many would be surprised to learn that Texas law allows physicians to forcibly remove a feeding tube against the will of the patient and their family. In fact, there is a greater legal penalty for failing to feed or water an animal than for a hospital to deny a human being food and water through a tube.

This is because there is no penalty whatsoever for a healthcare provider who wishes to deny artificially-administered nutrition and hydration (AANH). According to Texas Health and Safety Code, “every living dumb creature” is legally entitled access to suitable food and water.

Denying an animal food and water, like in this January case in San Antonio, is punishable by civil fines up to $10,000 and criminal penalties up to two years in jail per offense. Yet Texas law allows health care providers to forcibly deny food and water from human beings – what they would not be able to legally do to their housecat. And healthcare providers are immune from civil and criminal penalties for denial of food and water to human beings as long as they follow the current statutory process which is sorely lacking in safeguards.

Therefore, while it is surprising that Texas has the only state law that explicitly mentions food and water delivered artificially for the purpose of completely permitting its forced denial (the other six states mention AANH explicitly for the opposite purpose, to limit or prohibit its refusal), it is not at all surprising that the issue of protecting a patient’s right to food and water is perhaps the one point of consensus across all major stakeholders.

H.B. 3074 is the first TADA reform bill to include only this provision that is agreed upon across all major players in previous legislative sessions.

There are irreconcilable ideological differences between two major right-to-life organizations that should supposedly be like-minded: Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Right to Life. Each faction (along with their respective allies) have previously sponsored broad and ambitious bills to either preserve but reform the current law (Texas Alliance for Life’s position) or overturn it altogether as Texas Right to Life aims to do.

Prior to H.B. 3074, bills filed by major advocacy organizations have often included AANH, but also a host of other provisions that were so contentious and unacceptable to other organizations that each bill ultimately died, and this mutually-agreed-upon and vital reform always died along with it.

2011 & 2013 Legislative Sessions present prime example

This 2011 media report shows the clear consensus on need for legislation to simply address the need to protect patients’ rights to food and water:

“Hughes [bill sponsor for Texas Right to Life] has widespread support for one of his bill’s goals: making food and water a necessary part of treatment and not something that can be discontinued, unless providing it would harm the patient.”

Nonetheless, in 2013, both organizations and their allies filed complicated, contentious opposing bills, both of which would have protected a patient’s right to food and water but each bill also included provisions the rival group saw as contrary to their goals. Both bills were ultimately defeated and neither group was able to achieve protections for patients at risk of forced starvation and dehydration – a mutual goal that could have been met through a third, narrow bill like H.B. 3074.

H.B. 3074 finally focuses on what unites the organizations involved rather than what divides them, since these differences have resulted in a 12 year standoff with no progress whatsoever.

H.B. 3074 is progress that is pre-negotiated and pre-approved.

It is not a fertile springboard for negotiations on an area of mutual agreement. Rather it is the culmination of years of previous negotiations on bills that all came too late, either due to the complexnature of rival bills, the controversy involved, or even both.

On the contrary, H.B. 3074 is not just simply an area of agreement; moreover, it is has already been negotiated. It should not be stymied by disagreements on language, since Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Right to Life (along with their allies) were able to agree on language in 2007 with C.S.S.B. 439. C.S.S.B. 439 reads that, unlike the status quo that places no legal conditions on when food and water may be withdrawn, it would be permitted for those in a terminal condition if,

“reasonable medical evidence indicates the provision of artificial nutrition and hydration may hasten the patient’s death or seriously exacerbate other major medical problems and the risk of serious medical pain or discomfort that cannot be alleviated based on reasonable medical judgment outweighs the benefit of continued artificial nutrition and hydration.”

This language is strikingly similar to H.B. 3074 which states, “except that artificially administered nutrition and hydration must be provided unless, based on reasonable medical judgment, providingartificially administered nutrition and hydration would:

Hasten the patient’s death;

Seriously exacerbate other major medical problems not outweighed by the benefit of the provision of the treatment;

Result in substantial irremediable physical pain, suffering, or discomfort not outweighed by the benefit of the provision of the treatment;

Be medically ineffective; or

Be contrary to the patient’s clearly stated desire not to receive artificially administered nutrition or hydration.”

Texas Right to Life would support the language in H.B. 3074 that already has Texas Alliance for Life’s endorsement. Any reconciliation on the minor differences in language would therefore be minimal and could be made by either side, but ultimately, both sides and their allies would gain a huge victory – the first victory in 12 years on this vital issue.

It seems that the Texas Advance Directive Act, even among its sympathizers, has something for everyone to oppose.

The passage of H.B. 3074 and the legal restoration of rights to feeding tubes for Texas patients will not begin to satisfy critics of the Texas Advance Directives Act who desire much greater changes to the law and will assuredly continue to pursue them. H.B. 3074 in no way marks the end for healthcare reform, but perhaps a shift from the belief that anything short of sweeping changes is an endorsement of the status quo.

Rather, we can look at H.B. 3074 as breaking a barrier and indicating larger changes are possible.

And if nothing else, by passing H.B. 3074 introduced by State Rep. Drew Springer, we afford human beings in Texas the same legal access to food and water that we give to our horses. What is cruel to do to an animal remains legal to do to humans in Texas if organizations continue to insist on the whole of their agenda rather than agreeing to smaller bills like H.B. 3074.

The question is, can twelve years of bad blood and bickering be set aside for even this most noble of causes?

Only 3 Days Left!

I can’t believe how quickly our annual Spring campaign has flown by. Now,with only 3 days remaining, we still have $96,000 left to raise to meet our absolute minimum goal.

That’s why I must challenge you to stop everything, right now, and make a donation of whatever amount you can afford to support the pro-life and pro-family investigative reporting of LifeSite!

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For 17 years, we have relied almost exclusively on the donations of our growing army of everyday readers like you: readers who are tired of the anti-life and anti-family bias of the mainstream media, and who are looking for a different kind of news agency.

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You will find our donation page is incredibly simple and easy to use. Making your donation will take less than two minutes, and then you can get back to the pressing duties scheduled for your day. But those two minutes means the world to us!

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I want to thank the many readers who helped bring us within striking distance of our minimum goal with their donations over the weekend.

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